A Strong Military Prevents War and Safeguards Commerce

How can a strong military prevent war and safeguard commerce? Read on to find out.

A Strong Military Prevents War

As Nathaniel Davidson explains₁, World War II could have been stopped in its tracks had France intervened early. In the 1930s Adolf Hitler, Chancellor of Germany, scorned Treaty of Versailles and rebuilt the country’s armed forces.  At the time, the leaders of England and France were influenced by pacifism and attempted to appease Hitler.  In 1938 English Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain declared, “I believe it is peace in our time,” as he famously waived an agreement that he and Hitler had signed in Munich. However, only one year later, World War II began, making a mockery of the signed piece of paper.

Although Hitler could not be stopped by a piece of paper in 1938, he could have been stopped by a show of force back in 1936 when the French army was stronger. In 1936, German marched its military into the Rhineland, a region bordering Belgium and France, violating the terms of the Treaty of Versailles.  The treaty was signed at the end of World War I and prohibited Germany from remilitarizing the Rhineland, thus providing a safe buffer zone from the Germans for those two countries. Any remilitarization of that region by Germany should have been considered a hostile act. 

In 1936 when Germany marched in, France could have responded. As Davidson reports, “In fact, if the French had intervened, the German troops had orders to retreat. But instead, the French gave in and retreated instead. Hitler admitted: ‘The forty-eight hours after the march into the Rhineland were the most nerve-racking in my life. If the French had then marched into the Rhineland we would have had to withdraw with our tails between our legs, for the military resources at our disposal would have been wholly inadequate for even a moderate resistance.’”₂

Pacifists today respond that we don’t have any threats like Adolf Hitler, but Danielle Pletka disagrees. In her article₃, she identifies five major threats to the U.S:

• Terrorism waged by al Qaeda in Yemen and the Arabian Peninsula and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
• Nuclear weapons proliferation from North Korea and Pakistan, with Iran, Burma, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt desiring nuclear weapons.
• China’s rapid military buildup with new aircraft carriers, nuclear submarines, anti-ship ballistic missiles, and stealth fighters.
• Cyber warfare waged by Russia, China, and North Korea.
• Space warfare waged by China.

Dick Morris and Eileen McGann in their new book, Screwed!, provide details behind China’s military challenge to America’s influence over the South China Sea countries of Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and Taiwan. China has advanced technologically and developed a stealth fighter and an aircraft carrier and launched multiple vehicles into space.₄  China has also developed the world’s biggest spying operation, using computer hacking as a weapon. They are accused of massive hacking attacks on chemical and military-related companies to steal technical secrets.₅  They are also accused of hacking into the U.S. electrical grid, potentially “bringing our electrical grid to a standstill, paralyzing the entire country,”₆  andcreating secret openings for future access.

A Strong Military Safeguards Commerce

The Marine Hymn begins, “From the Halls of Montezuma, To the shores of Tripoli;…” The shores of Tripoli refer to the marine engagement during the First Barbary War (1801-1805) along the northern coast of Africa.₇ Pirate ships from the states of Algiers, Tunis, Morocco, and Tripoli (the Barbary Coast) captured merchant ships and enslaved or ransomed their crews to provide wealth for the Muslim rulers of those nations. In 1801, Yusuf Karamanli, the Pasha of Tripoli, demanded $225,000 from the U.S. President Thomas Jefferson refused and sent a small Navy and Marine force to the area to protect American ships and citizens.₈

Today, pirates still roam along the African coast, although not the northern coast of the Barbary nations but the eastearn coast of Somalia.  In April 2009, Navy snipers rescued an American cargo-ship captain from Somali pirates₉.  In January, 2012 Navy Seals rescued an American aid worker and her Danish colleague  from Somali pirates.₁₀

International trade is vital to the U.S. and protection from pirates or hostile countries is still needed. With the many threats in the world today, a strong military is still our best defense.

To Read More

Dick Morris and Eileen McGann, Screwed! How Foreign Countries Are Ripping America Off and Plundering Our Economy—and How Our Leaders Help Them Do It (Broadside Books, New York, 2012)

References

1. Nathaniel Davidson, Neville Boehner? RINOS channeling Chamberlain’s appeasement (Patriot Update, May 18 2011) Available at: http://patriotupdate.com/articles/neville-boehner-rinos-channelling-chamberlains-appeasement (June 1, 2012).
2. As cited in Ibid.
3. Danielle Pletka, Five major threats to the U.S., our allies and our interests (American Enterprise Institute, May 25, 2012 ) Available at: http://www.aei.org/article/foreign-and-defense-policy/danielle-pletka-five-major-threats-to-the-us-our-allies-and-our-interests/ (June 1, 2012).
4. Dick Morris and Eileen McGann, Screwed! How Foreign Countries Are Ripping America Off and Plundering Our Economy—and How Our Leaders Help Them Do It (Broadside Books, New York, 2012), 97.
5. Ibid, 97-101.
6. Ibid, 108.
7. Marines’ Hymn, (wikipedia.org, 3/5/2012) Available at: http://www.aei.org/article/foreign-and-defense-policy/danielle-pletka-five-major-threats-to-the-us-our-allies-and-our-interests/ (June 1, 2012).
8. First Barbary War (wikipedia.org, 5/13/2012) Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Barbary_War (June 1, 2012).
9. Hostage captain rescued; Navy snipers kill 3 pirates ((CNN World, April 12, 2009)) Available at: http://articles.cnn.com/2009-04-12/world/somalia.pirates_1_navy-snipers-three-pirates-bill-gortney?_s=PM:WORLD (June 1, 2012).
10. JEFFREY GETTLEMAN, ERIC SCHMITT and THOM SHANKER, U.S. Swoops In to Free 2 From Pirates in Somali Raid (The New York Times, January 25, 2012) Available at: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/26/world/africa/us-raid-frees-2-hostages-from-somali-pirates.html?pagewanted=all (June 1, 2012).

What Do the Constitution and Bible Say About National Defense

Before Tea Party Christians should argue that our country requires a strong military, we should first understand what the Constitution of the United States and the Bible says about national defense. Read on to find out.

What the Constitution says about national defense

As Ernest Istook explains in his America at Risk Memo₁, Article 1 Section 8 of the United States Constitution enumerates the powers of Congress. It begins:

The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;…

America’s priorities, according to the Constitution, is to first provide for the common defense and then generally for the nation’s welfare.

Regarding the common defense, the Constitution devotes six of seventeen clauses specifically to national defense. These include raising and supporting armies and the Navy, making the rules that govern the Armed Forces, and organizing, arming, and disciplining the state-level militia as well as the Army and Navy:

Clause 10: To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences against the Law of Nations;
Clause 11: To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;
Clause 12: To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;
Clause 13: To provide and maintain a Navy;
Clause 14: To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces;
Clause 15: To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
Clause 16: To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;

Clearly, the Constitution considers the national defense a high priority for government.

What the Bible says about national defense

Wayne Grudem in his book, Politics According to the Bible₂, argues that the Bible also places a high priority for national defense.  He cites 1 Peter 2:14 “or to governors, who are sent by him to punish those who do wrong and to commend those who do right,” as support for civil government to use force to punish those who do evil.

Grudem also cites Romans 13:1-4:

¹Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. … ⁴ For the one in authority is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for rulers do not bear the sword for no reason. They are God’s servants, agents of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.

In this passage Grudem explains that governments are authorized to “bear the sword.”  They do so, commanded by God, to protect citizens inside the country from evildoers.  As a consequence, the government certainly has an obligation to protect the citizens from threats outside of the country. Grudem provides the following examples from the Old Testament, in which the nation of Israel repeatedly had to defend itself against other nations (Philistines, Assyrians and Babylonians) .

Judges 2: 16-18 ¹⁶ Then the LORD raised up judges,who saved them out of the hands of these raiders….¹⁸ Whenever the LORD raised up a judge for them, he was with the judge and saved them out of the hands of their enemies as long as the judge lived; for the LORD relented because of their groaning under those who oppressed and afflicted them

2 Samuel 5: 17-25 ¹⁷ When the Philistines heard that David had been anointed king over Israel, they went up in full force to search for him, but David heard about it and went down to the stronghold. ¹⁸ Now the Philistines had come and spread out in the Valley of Rephaim; ¹⁹ so David inquired of the LORD, “Shall I go and attack the Philistines? Will you deliver them into my hands?”
The LORD answered him, “Go, for I will surely deliver the Philistines into your hands.” …²⁵ So David did as the LORD commanded him, and he struck down the Philistines all the way from Gibeon to Gezer.

Pacifists claim that the 6th Commandment in Exodus 20:13, “You shall not murder,” means that we should not go to war and kill. However Grudem explains that, “The Hebrew word translated murder in Exodus 20:13 is ratsakh, a word used forty-nine times in the Old Testament. It is never used to refer to killing in war (other Hebrew words are used for this). Rather, the word refers to what we would call “murder” in English today (the unlawful killing of another human being)….”₃

In Acts 10:1 “At Caesarea there was a man named Cornelius, a centurion in what was known as the Italian Regiment.”  Cornelius, a Romans centurion in command of 100 soldiers, accepted Christ and was baptized as a believer with no mention that his occupation as soldier was undesirable. In Luke 14:31 Jesus speaks matter-of-factly about war without condemning it to make another point: “Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Won’t he first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand?.”

Pacifists often claim that Matthew 5:39 “But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also,” provides support for Jesus’ opposition to war. However, Jesus’ teaching applies to individual conduct not to civil government conduct. In fact Romans 13: 1-4 teaches that God authorizes governments to use deadly force if necessary to oppose evil.₄

Furthermore, Jesus implies the use of deadly force for self-defense in Luke 22:36, where “He said to them, ‘But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one.’”

Regarding non-interventionism, Grudem says there is no Biblical support. He cites Obadiah 1:11 “On the day you stood aloof while strangers carried off his wealth and foreigners entered his gates and cast lots for Jerusalem, you were like one of them.” In this passage God rebukes the nation of Edom for failing to provide Israel military support when attacked by the Babylonians.₅

Clearly the Constitution and Bible provide strong support for national defense. To purposely weaken our military as a unilateral showing of pacifism is not only illogical but unsupported by either the Constitution or Bible.

To Read More

Wayne Grudem, Politics According to the Bible; A Comprehensive Resource for Understanding Modern Political Issues in Light of Scripture (Zondervan, Grand Rapids, 2010).

References

1. Ernest Istook, The Constitutional Charge to Defend America (The Heritage Foundation, America at Risk Memo #AR 11-05, May 31st 2011) Available at: http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2011/05/the-constitutional-charge-to-defend-america (May 30, 2012).
2. Wayne Grudem, Politics According to the Bible (Zondervan, Grand Rapids, 2010), 388.
3. Ibid, 389.
4. Ibid, 391.
5. Ibid, 398-399.